Trio of firms adding jobs at Eastman Business Park

Nearly three years after announcing their move to the Eastman Business Park, three international companies have combined for at least 75 new jobs, with at least 50 more resulting from a new manufacturing facility in the Rochester region, officials say.

The move of Intrinsiq Materials Inc., Quintel Technology Ltd. and Omni-ID Ltd. to Rochester was announced June 1, 2010, with a promise to add 250 jobs.

Trillium International LLC, an entity of Perinton-based private-equity firm the Trillium Group LLC, manages the three locally headquartered companies, Intrinsiq, Quintel and Omni, and four others included in its portfolio.

All three have added jobs, said James Stoffel, a Trillium International general partner. He was unable to provide specific numbers.

"We've already got, at all three companies, between 75 and 100 people," Stoffel said.

"Those are all good jobs. We moved people here from overseas. We moved people here from Texas. We moved people from all sorts of places to Rochester. Probably 75 percent of the people are local."

The presence of the three firms here has spawned a high-technology telecommunications manufacturing plant on the grounds of another company in the region. Stoffel declined to disclose its location, citing a confidentiality agreement with the property owner.

The manufacturing operation employs 50 to 75 staffers, Stoffel said.

That operation and its employment were not part of the original plan, said Mark Peterson, president and CEO of Greater Rochester Enterprise Inc.

"It is not unusual with high-tech jobs for there to be a significant multiplier effect, both in service-sector jobs and in supplier company jobs," Peterson said. "This is why we work hard to win these types of jobs, because they inevitably result in the creation of more jobs for the region than even those created as part of the project itself."

Including the unforeseen regional manufacturing center, employment totals approach and perhaps surpass original projections of 165 jobs by the end of 2012.

Peterson cites two reasons for the slower growth at the business park: a transfer of management to Trillium International in March 2011 and delays in receiving state funding for the project because of a change in governors.

David Paterson held the state's top job when the companies' move to the business park was announced. Paterson was succeeded by Andrew Cuomo on Jan. 1, 2011.

"They are growing," Peterson said. "They are making their targets. They're not to their full ramp-up yet. In fact, they probably won't complete their ramp-up until mid-2015. But they have hired people, a bunch of former Kodakers and others. They continue to bring product to market."

Intrinsiq Materials, a developer of advanced materials, pledged to create 158 jobs in research, development and manufacturing here. It has retained an Intrinsiq Materials Ltd. research and development site in Farnborough, England.

Quintel Technology, a maker of wireless network antenna systems, promised 68 jobs at a research and development center here.

Omni-ID, a maker of radio frequency identification technology, projected 24 hires in research and development. It retains a European office in Farnham, England.

Trillium International invested more than $1 million to renovate Building 320 at 1200 Ridgeway Ave. for the three headquarters, said Stoffel, an executive at Xerox Corp. for 20 years and at Eastman Kodak Co. for seven years.

"They're three completely different companies," Peterson said. "Each is at a different sort of (employment) level.

"Two of the companies are moving pretty fast and are really probably far ahead of where we thought they'd be at this time. One of the companies is taking a little bit more time, but they still have nearly two years left before there's any expectation for them to be at their full build-out."

Employment at Quintel and at Omni-ID will reach at least 80 each, Peterson said.

"I think they're well on target, if not ahead of schedule," he said. "The ramp-up at Intrinsiq has been a little slower. They've done a bunch of stuff. They're doing some additional fundraising. I still have a lot of confidence that they're going to get where they're supposed to be."

Among Intrinsiq's initiatives is a partnership with Rochester Institute of Technology to produce printed devices and materials. The work is being funded with $599,390 from the National Science Foundation and also includes NovaCentrix Corp. of Austin, Texas, and Optomec Inc. of Albuquerque, N.M.

Quintel, Omni-ID and Intrinsiq were among seven companies in the portfolio of British private-equity firm Cody Gate Ventures LLP when the move to Rochester was announced. Management was transferred to Trillium International 10 months later.

The largest stakeholders in the Trillium International portfolio are private-equity firm Coller Capital and consulting firm Quintiq Group PLC, both based in London.

Representatives of Coller Capital, the world's largest investor in the secondary market, requested that the Rochester transplants be locally managed, which led to Trillium's involvement.

The principals and general partners for Trillium International are Trillium Group general partner Jose Coronas and Stoffel.

"That created some delays in doing some things here, but the three companies still came," Peterson said.

The transition to Trillium International came two months after Cuomo became governor.

"The state had to reconfigure things," Peterson said. "We actually ended up having to renegotiate pieces of the deal. It wasn't that the (state) money wasn't there. But you had a change of administrations.

"Whenever you do a deal and it doesn't get fully completed before you change governors, it takes time to get it reorganized."

State officials inspected the details of the move before allowing it to go forward.

"We got that all squared away," Peterson said. "It took more time than any of us wanted it to, and Jose and I spent a lot of time screaming bloody murder at state people to get it accomplished, but we did get it accomplished."